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SEOUL, South Korea – They came from all over the world, poles in hand, and feet ready to inch more than half a mile across a high wire strung over the Han River in a spine-tingling battle of balance, speed and high anxiety.

As part of its annual city festival, the South Korean capital staged Thursday what was billed as the world’s first high-wire championship, drawing 18 contestants from nine countries for three days of supreme feats of concentration.

Each acrobat must navigate the 1.2-inch-thick wire that spans the river, with the top prize of $15,000 going to the person crossing it fastest.

The ‘reform’ in the title allows ministers to make laws without the scrutiny of parliament and, in some cases, to delegate that power to unelected officials. In every word, dot and comma, it bears the imprint of New Labour’s authoritarian paternity.

Rather than the thunderous applause that accompanies the death of liberty in the Star Wars Empire the death of democracy seems to be with a thunderous silence as the bill has slipped under the radar of the British public.

If ever there were a piece of legislation to ensure the United Kingdom’s traversal through the event horizon of the Panopticon Singularity it is the Legislative and Regulatory Reform Bill.

I’m probably far too paranoid and could possibly even be wrong given the almost impenetrable legalese used in parliamentary bills about the implications of the bill. However it would seem to me that this bill sets the ideal stage from which to modify not only existing legislation but legislation yet to be passed due to various obstacles being placed in the government’s way such as the current situation with the Identity Card bill. The government can make any necessary concessions to ensure the bill gets passed and then modify any legislation introduced by such a bill back to a form they would have liked in the first place but that parliament didn’t approve of.

According to Murky.org the Legislative and Regulatory Reform Bill was discussed on Law in Action on BBC Radio 4. From Murky’s transcript of the programme comes the following quote from Cambridge Professor of Law, John Spencer QC plus a comment from Murky.

It is unbelievably dangerous. It means potentially marginalising parliament. It moves us a big step toward the elected dictatorship every five years, it’s a step toward a system under which the only break that we have on our ministers is the fact that there’s a general election every five years. (He seems to overlook the fact that even this may not be guaranteed, as, if I recall correctly, the five years is set by the parliament act, which is itself changable by the Legislative and Regulatory Reform Act – Murk)

As if I don’t already have enough paranoid nightmares at the moment.

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Bio

Matt Wharton is an entrepreneur, photographer, publisher, writer and occasional systems administrator. He was also in a former life a cinema manager. Educated at the University of Bath he holds a degree in Electronic and Communication Engineering and is Cisco, Citrix and Microsoft certified.